


How to save a life

by thyandra



Category: Tokyo Ghoul
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, CCG!Hide, Emotional Hurt, Emotional Manipulation, Hide takes Amon's role during the Owl Extermination Raid, Hurt No Comfort, I'm so sorry, Investigator!Hide, M/M, Role Reversal, Suicidal Thoughts, What-If
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-03
Updated: 2016-07-03
Packaged: 2018-07-19 22:33:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,319
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7380061
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thyandra/pseuds/thyandra
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>To be completely fair, Hide never thought of himself as the superhero type.<br/>Shoulders squared with a resolve he didn’t quite feel but showed off nonetheless, jaw set in determination and posture stiff as to not give any of his real feelings away, Hide thought that that had always been Kaneki’s role, not his. Still, the carefully crafted mask of confidence he was wearing reminded him of just how much was at stake that night. Just how much depended on the success of his little impersonification.<br/>It didn’t matter that Hide didn’t feel like a hero. For Kaneki’s sake he was willing to try the part. </p>
<p>or: </p>
<p>that one fic in which Hide is an investigator and Kaneki is faced with his best friend of a lifetime instead of Amon, as he fights his way to Anteiku during the Owl Extermination Raid.</p>
            </blockquote>





	How to save a life

**Author's Note:**

> _Step one, you say, "We need to talk."_   
>  _He walks, you say, "Sit down. It's just a talk."_   
>  _He smiles politely back at you ___  
>  _You stare politely right on through_   
>  _Some sort of window to your right_   
>  _As he goes left and you stay right_   
>  _Between the lines of fear and blame_   
>  _You begin to wonder why you came_
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> _Where did I go wrong? I lost a friend_   
>  _Somewhere along in the bitterness_   
>  _And I would have stayed up with you all night_   
>  _Had I known how to save a life_
> 
>  
> 
> _Let him know that you know best_  
>  _'Cause after all you do know best_  
>  _Try to slip past his defense_  
>  _Without granting innocence_  
>  _Lay down a list of what is wrong_  
>  _The things you've told him all along_  
>  _Pray to God, he hears you_  
>  _And I pray to God, he hears you_  
>  (The Fray - How to save a life)

To be completely fair, Hide never thought of himself as the superhero type.

Shoulders squared with a resolve he didn’t quite feel but showed off nonetheless, jaw set in determination and posture stiff as to not give any of his real feelings away, Hide thought that that had always been Kaneki’s role, not his. Still, the carefully crafted mask of confidence he was wearing reminded him of just how much was at stake that night. Just how much depended on the success of his little impersonification.

It didn’t matter that Hide didn’t feel like a hero. For Kaneki’s sake he was willing to try the part.

A wolfish smile contorted his features for the briefest of seconds. Life had a really roundabout way to turn things upside down, and wearing his friend’s shoes felt foreign just as much as deeming selfless this crazy mission of his.

Hah. Wasn’t that exactly Kaneki’s life mantra, though? Instead of hurting others, be the one who gets hurt. What a little martyr complex. Hide didn’t even know whether he was doing this right. Sure enough, he was being just as selfish as that philosophy asked of him. If he wasn’t this terrified, maybe he’d even laugh at the irony.

His earpiece buzzed with static. “Rank 1 Nagachika,” the voice said, “please give us your report.”

Hide raised a hand to the device, obeying his orders as he embraced the street with a wary look. The night was as still as a dream. It felt wrong, as though it was ready to shatter at the sound of a clown’s derisive laugh, despite Hide’s best efforts. The calm before the storm.

_Fool, fool, fool._

The words were taunting in his head, but he couldn’t bring himself to deny them. What if they were right?

When it came to Kaneki, unpredictability was a factor that played a big role, and as much as Hide prided himself on his good skills at reading people, his best friend had always been a particular difficult book.

He exhaled slowly, taking another look at his surroundings, searching for that distinctive head of white hair. How much had already changed, he thought distantly, _and who knows if I’m not already too late_.

If you asked him what the hell he thought he was doing there, huddled up in his combat gear, quinque at hand and panic in his heart, you would’ve  only gotten an artificial and self-conscious laugh, a shrug of his shoulders and an empty look in his usually honest eyes.

He really had no idea. And maybe for the first time in his life he also didn’t know what the outcome of his planning would be. Hide had never deemed himself a gambler, but the more he went over each and every possibility with feverish urgency, the more he realized this seemed more like a fool’s path than actual strategy. Maybe that was it. Maybe he _had_ to be a Fool to finally walk on the same road as his childhood friend. Maybe he had to allow himself to take the risks; maybe it was because he’d never done as much, that he’d lost him.

But luck was a untrustworthy companion and Hide had never liked the feel of playing chess blindfolded. Still, the thought of leaving Kaneki on the patterned field without a guidance of sorts was madness, and despite his worst fears, Hide couldn’t bring himself to take that step away from the battlefield. Couldn’t bring himself to step away from Kaneki for good.

His earpiece buzzed again. “Movement in the quadrant D16. Repeat, enemy rapidly approaching from quadrant D16. Don’t let them get closer to the Zone.”

That got Hide’s attention, as he mumbled an assertive into his device. That was his quadrant. He took the earpiece from his ear and let it fall to the ground, crushing it with the sole of his boot. He exhaled slowly, concentrating.

_That’s him. He’s finally here. There’s no way it can be anyone else_ , he thought.

Hide was sure he’d come. That was the only part of his plan he’d never doubted. What was to follow was a mystery, though. Kaneki had always been the better one at inspirational speeches. Hide? He’d always put his arms behind his neck, offering a honest smile and a home to always come back to. He’d never been one for rhetorics. Still, it had always been enough that way between the two of them.

Now, he wasn’t so sure anymore.

A bitter laugh bubbled in his throat, threatening to slip, and he struggled against it. He didn’t want to jinx it.

No, Hide really was no superhero at all. He liked to think of himself as a good friend, despite the frequent lack of input on his best friend’s part sometimes made him doubt just that.

The truth was, even if Kaneki had decided to hate him, or if he had just realized he was better off without him in this new life of his, Hide still couldn’t bear the thought of letting him go. Actually, scratch that. Deep down, his worst fear was that Kaneki already did as much, and he was just fooling himself into thinking that showing up in the raid would really help to make up for whatever went so horrifically wrong with them, to the point Kaneki thought it was better if he left him behind without as much as an explanation or a goodbye.

He swallowed hard and let himself take a defensive stance.

_Guess it’s finally time for me to know for sure, uh?_

Even as he thought so, his chest couldn’t help but clench painfully as his eyes caught a rapid movement at the corner of his left side. Hide saw a flash of red before he could make out the white strands, then there was a sound like a hammer to a wall and the figure was airborne, using his kagune as leverage and the momentum of his jump to fling himself at him.

Hide thanked his fast reflexes for the hand that immediately raised above his head to shield himself with his staff. The kagune impacted hard with the solid thickness of his quinque steel, sending sparkles flying everywhere, and Hide’s muscles cried under the strain of a ghoul’s superior strength.

He laughed weakly, voice tense and guard still high, as he forced himself not to let his mask crack. “I wasn’t exactly expecting a heartwarming reunion, but you sure look happy to see me, too, Kaneki.”

A sharp inhale, and suddenly the force on Hide’s quinque disappeared, unbalancing him, almost making him fall forward on his face. He caught himself on time and plastered a smile he didn’t quite mean on his face as his look appraised his long lost friend.

“Hi… de?”

For some reason, that simple, pained whisper punched Hide’s stomach harder than any other jumbled and pathetic excuse ever could’ve. He swallowed hard. The air between them still felt inexplicably and unnaturally still.

“Yup, that’s me,” he confirmed toothily. He felt more than saw Kaneki’s only visible eye, the kakugan one, widen with a sentiment Hide couldn’t quite place, but that looked a lot like fear. Kaneki fell to his knees, bringing a hand to support his head like he wasn’t sure he would be able to keep it up anymore, and his fingers tightened their grip on his silvery locks, tearing at them with a ferocity Hide couldn’t quite justify, though he sure as hell was able to see right through. Hide’s gaze became sadder as he crouched down to his level, and he almost reached out to him, but stopped short when he saw that haunted look in his friend’s eye. It had returned to the familiar, storm grey Hide had always known, and it made a lump form in his throat because he’d missed it so much he’d thought he’d never get to see it again.

He forced his voice to stay light. “Thanks for backing down, though, one more minute and my jello arms would’ve fallen off, buddy. You sure put on some muscle, uh?”

Silence only met his words, and Hide listened for what felt like minutes on end the sharp thrum of his loud heartbeat and Kaneki’s ragged and laboured breathing, amplified thousandfolds by the cacophony of quinque steel against flesh in the distance, giving him a grim omen of what was to come for them, too, if he didn’t do this right. The sound of war raged in his head like the static between an interrupted line, and his words caught in his throat because they didn’t match what was in his heart.

Instead, he chose to risk that touch. His hand moved on autopilot until it found Kaneki’s shoulder with familiar fondness, and squeezed in what he hoped was a reassuring manner, as he intently listened to his soft mumbles, trying to make out what he was saying. He hadn’t even registered Hide’s touch, he was so absorbed in his panic.

“No,” he heard Kaneki’s tiny whisper, “nonono, he’s not here he can’t be here can’t be here can’t–”

Hide dropped his mask altogether. “I am, though. And I’m not letting you go another time, Kaneki.”

With a strangled breath that resembled a whine, Kaneki’s eye found his face again, inspecting it, appraising him, as though he wasn’t sure he wanted to believe the reality in front of his eye, as though he didn’t trust it.

“But you _can’t_ ,” he said with a despair Hide couldn’t fully understand. Something changed in Kaneki’s stance as soon as his frantic gaze fell on Hide’s white coat and on the hand still holding the quinque in a white knuckled grip, and his every muscle under Hide’s other hand stiffened. Then his eye raised to Hide’s brown ones again, and searched for a lie.

He crouched in himself, bracing his sides in a tight grip and backing away, his head bowed and his shoulders trembling, when he found none.

“F-For how long…” Kaneki swallowed hard when his voice broke mid-sentence, and he still refused to look at him even as he forced himself to complete that question with a feverish urgency. “How long have you known?”

It occurred to Hide that Kaneki’s stance wasn’t defensive at all. It was _submissive_. Kaneki wasn’t shielding himself from Hide’s condemnation. He was waiting for Hide’s _execution_ without a protest, offering him all of his openings.

Hide swallowed, too, forcing his voice to stay light even as he felt his heart in his throat. “Does it matter? You’re still my best buddy. I would never leave your side.” The sentiment came automatically, before Hide could think better of it and realize his mistake. Months of loneliness got the better of him and of any strategic talk he could’ve thought of, leaving him raw, naked under his best friend’s scrutiny.

Except Kaneki wasn’t looking at him anymore. Instead, Kaneki’s shoulders trembled again with a different sort of apprehension, and Hide understood immediately why that had been the wrong answer. He bowed his head too, under the weight of a hundred incomprehensions that still stretched between them, and a thousand more he still didn’t know how to clear out.

Hide had never resented him for _leaving_. No, if anything, he’d only hated that he hadn’t been able to see it coming. He hadn’t been able to _make_ Kaneki stay. The only reason he was mad, though, wasn’t any of that. Far from it. What really burned was the thought that his friend of a whole lifetime had refused to _trust_ him.

Ah. How pathetic of him, when Hide himself had never quite returned the favour, instead choosing to put himself in second place, choosing to never speak any of his real thoughts, any of his real feelings aloud, in fear of scaring away the only real person he’d ever deeply cared about.

But no, that wasn’t the right train of thought. He didn’t came here to confess his feelings. He came here to acknowledge _Kaneki’s_.

He took a steadying breath in, then out, knowing full well what his previous reply might have sounded like to the beaten up ego of his only long time friend. “Listen,” he tried again, “I know I should’ve said something sooner…” He trailed off, unsure, scratching his cheek.  His stomach churned.

He had to be straight-forward, right? That was the only way to bridge the growing distance he felt between them. But that was also scary as hell. What if Kaneki didn’t acknowledge him? What then? He wasn’t sure he knew the answer. He sighed. “But I really don’t care about that stuff.” He shrugged one shoulder, and tried a smile. It felt strained and apologetic. “It’s in the past now. Let’s just go back home, buddy.”

Kaneki lifted his gaze again at that. “You… you don’t” he repeated in a tiny voice, incredulously.

Hide just nodded. “‘S still you,” he offered, but Kaneki wasn’t listening anymore. Hide wasn’t sure he’d been listening to him at all, if the way he made himself look even smaller, retreating further into himself, was any indication. He buried his head in his arms and let out a whimper, cutting Hide out as he resumed muttering broken sentences under his breath.

Hide’s heart constricted at the sight, and he struggled to find something else to say, something that could break him out of that daze.

_Shit_. he knew that straight-forwardness just wasn’t his thing. _What now? Think, think_ , think, _you stupid brain… How can I comfort him when he’s not even listening to me…? What can I–_

“Why…”

Hide would’ve almost missed the tiny whisper, if his panic-y state hadn’t made him hyper-aware of any sound, of any breath of air surrounding him. “Why,” Kaneki tried again, “did you become a dove, then?” he let out after what felt like hours, but must have been just a few seconds. He peeked at him from behind his arms, and his voice didn’t sound accusatory as Hide had expected it to be, but resigned. “You still haven’t impaled me. _Why_?”

It was such a simple question, really, and it required an even simpler answer. _Because I love you and I care about you, you idiot_. But Hide couldn’t bring himself to say it. Not when Kaneki still looked ready to flee from him any moment.

Hide looked at his quinque with a contemplative gaze, as though wondering himself why he was still holding it. He let it retreat into the briefcase and sat on the ground cross-legged. “It hasn’t shown the black and reds in a while now, y’know,” he commented, gesturing vaguely to his own eye. “You can just drop the mask already. It feels weird talking to that creepy grin all gums,” he tried to joke.

He hoped that his change of topic wasn’t as obvious and awkward as he reckoned it was.

Kaneki seemed to catch on to the unspoken words, and for the first time since he’d stepped on the battlefield, Hide felt completely exposed and weak.

_I wonder what it is that you’re finally realizing_ , he thought. _My cowardice, or my mirroring selfishness?_

He thought he knew the answer, when he caught Kaneki’s shoulders drop.

“Do you, though?” Kaneki asked dubiously, but now sounding more like himself. Hide would’ve almost smiled at the familiar show of reluctance that was so typical of their friendly banter it sent a pang to his heart.

Kaneki hesitated for a moment, then his fingers reached for the back of his head to untie the laces of his mask. He was avoiding Hide’s gaze. “You say so now,” he muttered without any intonation, “but you haven’t even seen the worst of it.”

Hide didn’t have anything to say to that. It was true after all. He hadn’t been there when things got ugly for his friend, and it didn’t matter that it had been Kaneki’s choice not to let him see. “What if I want to?” The truth was, Hide wasn’t sure he could do this alone. Not if Kaneki kept pushing him away like this.

Kaneki looked him in the eyes, surprising Hide with the intensity of his look. He was dead serious, even as he completely ignored Hide’s question. “Why are you even here, Hide?” he finally inquired, finally uttering the sentence that impended on their heads. “It’s _dangerous_ out here.”

_And look who’s talking_ , Hide thought.

He sighed deeply, forcing out all of the tension building up in his muscles. “I never wanted for anything to end up like this,” he said, and he hated how tired his voice sounded just then.

Kaneki gave him an indecipherable look. “Like what? Like _a joke_? Like some fucked up tragedy? Yeah, me neither,” he said bitterly, without the bite Hide felt anyway. It was almost like he was rereading a well known book, rehearsing lines with the ease that came from dozens of hours spent rereading the same ones, turning the same pages, hoping for a different ending that never came. He said it with the tone of someone who’d already given up a fight. “I didn’t ask for any of this, believe me,” Kaneki said. “I never asked to become a monster.”

Hide hated how defeated he sounded. Superheroes didn’t get defeated by the bad guys, he thought. Superheroes didn’t live hiding in the gray lines like Hide. They set up an example for everyone, and then lived up to it themselves. They didn’t crawl on their arms and knees, they learned to fly. So why wasn’t Kaneki flying, yet? Where was his selfishness, now?

Why couldn’t he save himself along with everyone else?

“Is this why you’re here? Why you’re going to Anteiku?” Hide then asked, with a indiscernible frown. “To let yourself be killed like the monster you claim you are?” He didn’t mean for his voice to sound so stern, but maybe that had been the most honest thing he’d said that night.

Kaneki didn’t reply. Instead, he rose to his feet and looked away.

“I need to go.”

“No, you don’t,” Hide said, gripping his arm tightly. “I don’t care what the stuff on your file says, Kaneki. You’re not a monster. I _know_ you.”

Kaneki’s muscles tensed. “So you read it.” It was an observation, nothing more and nothing less. It still made Hide feel guilty for reasons unbeknownst to him, like he’d inadvertently crossed a line, failed a test he didn’t know he had to pass. Like he’d seen a part of Kaneki his friend didn’t even want to acknowledge it existed.

Kaneki’s accusation had sounded _empty_. Devoid of emotion, like whatever demon was that was wearing his best friend’s face had drained him of everything that made him himself and left bared and grotesque gums in his place.

“I did,” Hide admitted easily. “I even infiltrated the CCG and waited for them to make me an investigator, just to follow your trail.” He paused briefly, then a slow smile stretched on his face. “You’ve always been awfully good at playing Hide and Seek, but I was better than you at Tag.”

Despite himself, Kaneki let a rueful smile grace his own features. It was the only true emotion beside open despair Hide had seen him wear that night. He was willing to hold on to it, whatever it took. For this once, he let himself be manipulative even with Kaneki, the only person he’d sworn to never betray.

“I missed you, y'know?” he whispered in a soft voice, “It wasn’t fair to leave me without a goodbye, Kaneki.”

Maybe it had just been his insecurity speaking, because however much Hide liked to put on the mask that made him appear like the stronger one, he feared loneliness just as much as his childhood friend. And deep down, he was afraid that was the only thing that kept them together up until now, both of them too scared to let go and be left alone with their own mind.

Kaneki didn’t reply. He didn’t even turn in his direction. The only giveaway that he’d even heard Hide’s words was the tension of his muscles where Hide’s hand still held on tightly, to keep him from leaving. That, and the way the ghost of his smile had dropped instantly.

Hide knew that Kaneki could’ve easily freed himself anytime. He chose to believe there was something that was making him stay.

“Go home, Hide,” he finally declared. “You’ll get yourself killed out here.”

Hide heard anyway the _Where I can’t protect you_ that had gone unsaid.

“Not without you,” Hide insisted, because what was the point in returning to his empty apartment if there wasn’t anyone to wait for him there? What was the point of calling it _Home_ , if Kaneki wasn’t there?

“I need to go,” Kaneki repeated again, his voice dull, his posture stiff. “I need to get to the Manager before they do.”

Hide felt something shatter in the left corner of his chest. He swallowed thickly the harsh words he felt bubbling up in his throat, together with the frustration of always coming too late, of never _being enough_ , of failing himself and all his beliefs. “You don’t _have_ to.”

“But _I do_.” This time, he turned around. Hide wasn’t ready to see the agony twisting those familiar features, nor the anguish of his following words. “I’m done with not being able to do a thing.”

Hide’s stomach churned, because he knew that look. It was the same dead-eyed stare he’d seen in his best friend’s irises for _months_ after his mother’s death.

Suddenly, Hide was very, very afraid. Panic gripped his heart in a vice grip and turned all his wariness into utter desperation.

“Ken, please,” he begged, feeling tears bite his eyes but refusing to let them pool in them, clouding the sight of the only true person he’d ever held dear to his heart.

He hadn’t called him that in _years_. Not since the reminder of his given name had been enough to summon unwanted, painful memories of a softer, more high pitched and feminine voice repeating the same name over and over in his head, sounding more and more affectionate as the months from her death turned to years, and then to dust.

They weren’t doing this again. Not if Hide could help it.

“This has nothing to do with you,” he called out desperately, grasping at straws. “There was no way you could’ve prevented it from happening. It wasn’t your _fault_!”

He wasn’t holding him by the wrist anymore, instead placing both hands on his shoulders and shaking him. Kaneki’s gaze was so faraway, and for a horrible second Hide thought he’d never be able to cross the distance to be at his side ever again.

He let out a shuddering breath and knocked their foreheads together, closing his eyes as he felt the first tear in years cross the side of his face. “Please, Kaneki, you don’t have to prove anything to yourself. Please, just stay here. I’m _begging_ you. Don’t go. Don’t sacrifice your life for this useless, second-hand pride.”

Kaneki had raised his hands to cup Hide’s cheeks, pulling him away from the contact. “Hide,” he just breathed, slowly, stubbornly. “I–”

“No. That’s not–” Hide’s voice broke again, and he tried again one more time, opening his eyes and locking his gaze to his friend’s. He swallowed hard when he saw the resolve in those stormy gray irises. “This is bullshit,” he cut himself off, voice stern. “I’m not letting you do this.” He shook his head, grasping Kaneki’s palms between his. They felt cold, so cold, and Hide wanted to puke. They felt like life had already left his best friend’s body.

“I won’t let you get in my way, Hide,” Kaneki said, softly but surely. He pulled his hands free from his companion’s ones, and his gaze hardened in a way Hide had never seen before. It felt foreign. Kaneki had changed, that much was true, but for something to change something else had to stay the same; but that look in his eyes…. that was something else. That posture, that stiffness in his shoulders, that way he cracked his index finger– This wasn’t a Kaneki he recognized because this new persona, this puppet wearing his best friend’s features wasn’t given birth from Kaneki’s personality in the first place. There was no way his kind-hearted, gentle, compassionate and empathetic Kaneki could’ve changed into this. Into this _impersonator_. No, no… This wasn’t him. This was someone else entirely, something else entirely. It was a surrogate, a fungus bacteria that had grown his way under his best friend’s skin, feasted in his loving nature that had welcomed it as part of himself.

This was Jason cannibalizing his way inside another innocent life yet again; it was Rize, laughing her shrill and mocking disrespect for life: this was Kaneki’s mother, the one planting that toxin of self doubt that had started it all.

“I will come back,” Kaneki said, because that was what he’d always wanted: someone who would’ve cried for him, cried his loss.

That was when Hide realized he wouldn’t see him ever again.

“Wait for me,” Kaneki said, dashing away, and Hide screamed his name, lunging after him, grasping at air.

Kaneki was gone.

Hide failed. He hadn’t been able to stop him. He hadn’t been enough _once again_.

Kaneki was _gone_ , and Hide didn’t even see him vanish in the night, because those traitorous tears he’d never wanted for Kaneki to see were now pooling in his eyes.

And so he fell to his knees and cried, cried like his best friend had cried for his mother’s funeral, cried because he’d finally understood what helplessness felt like.

But it was no use, because those tears, the only thing that could’ve made Kaneki stay, had come too late, much like himself.

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on my tumblr. [Here's](http://bloodycarnations.tumblr.com/post/146676188734/how-to-save-a-life-hidekane) the link in case you wanted to like/reblog it for whatever reason.  
> Please do let me know what you thought of this fic, be it a good or a bad impression, I don't care. I have a feeling I made Kaneki OOC and I'd love to hear your opinion on it, if you're still reading this. Sacrificing two minutes of your time won't hurt, right? *crosses fingers*  
> Btw, feel free to come screaming in my tumblr askbox that I'm a sadist, I probably deserve it


End file.
